Another Michigan farmworker has been diagnosed with bird flu, the third human case associated with an outbreak in U.S. dairy cows, health officials said Thursday.
The dairy worker reported a cough, congestion, sore throat and watery eyes. The other two patients had only eye symptoms, health officials said. The farmworker was given antivirals and is recovering from respiratory symptoms, health officials said.
The risk to the public remains low, although farmworkers exposed to infected animals are at higher risk, health officials said. The Michigan cases occurred on different farms and there are no signs of spread among people, officials said. “Risk depends on exposure, and in this case, the relevant exposure is to infected animals,” the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said in a statement.
A human case with respiratory symptoms was not unexpected — flu-like symptoms have been seen in past cases of people who got other strains of bird flu from poultry. But it does raise the odds of possible spread, said the CDC's Dr. Nirav Shah.
“Simply put, someone who's coughing may be more likely to transmit the virus than someone who has an eye infection” he said. In late March, a farmworker in Texas was diagnosed in what officials called the first known instance globally of a person catching this version of bird flu — H5N1 Type A — from a mammal. Last week, Michigan officials announced the second U.
S. case . That worker developed eye symptoms after “a direct splas.